Warning: Hearing the Way Ed Schultz Spoke to a 23-Year Military Veteran May Make Your Blood Boil

A retired military veteran called in during Ed Schultz's radio program on Thursday to respectfully disagree with the host's claim that Republicans are an enemy to the nation's vets. Rather than having a reasonable debate, Schultz screamed at the caller, "Russell," and called his point of view an "idiot argument."

"I just called to disagree with you about Democrats caring about veterans. I’m a retired veteran with 23 years of service and I don’t know if you know it, but 1 October, 171,000 of us were kicked off our health care. And those ‘evil Republicans,’ as you like to call them, passed a bill in June and it’s been sitting in the Senate and Reid won’t bring it up," the 23-year veteran began.

“First of all, you have, uh, your facts wrong,” Schultz responded, changing the subject and hollering over the caller when he tried to respond. “I’m not going to freaking argue with you, Russell. You’re full of crap, okay? You’re full of it. The government shutdown hurt the veterans. Is that wrong or right?"

“It hasn’t hurt us yet,” Russell said.

Schultz then vowed to "break your idiot argument down piece by piece!"

The caller again reiterated that he is one of the 171,000 retired veterans who lost their benefits, a move that was supposedly intended to "reduce the cost of providing health care to military retirees." The Democrats refuse to consider the Republican's proposal to address the problem, he said. The vet also said he didn't retire from the military for Obamacare.

"You have your facts wrong," Schultz repeated, without actually explaining what facts were wrong. "You know what, you need a right-wing talker."

"You can pin blame on whatever bill you want to pin blame on. The devil is in the details. The buck stops with the dollar. Who shut the government down? The Republicans. The Republicans," Schultz continued. "Who’s hanging in the balance right now? That Vietnam veteran with his legs lost, in a wheelchair, his only hope is to get a VA check. Who cut that off? And you’re telling me that you’re worried about health care when you’ve got a situation like that?"

Schultz did not mention that the GOP passed appropriations bills to restore all funding to the VA during the shutdown, but it was rejected by the Democrats.

Then the host just got downright ugly.

"Hey, sir," Russell responded respectfully.

"Sir? Don't sir me! I'm not a 'sir' to you the way you talk to me!" Schultz screamed.

A few minutes later, he hung up on the military veteran because he didn't want to "deal" with him.

"Veterans, I don’t know who got in between their ears to make them think that the Republicans are their best friend. It drives me nuts. It drives me nuts. I admit it," he concluded.

(H/T: Mediaite)

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